The purpose of government - health care

ATLANTA — In the most important appeal of the Obamacare constitutional saga, today was the best day yet for individual freedom. The government’s lawyer, Neal Katyal, spent most of the hearing on the ropes, with the judicial panel extremely cautious not to extend federal power beyond its present outer limits of regulating economic activity that has a substantial aggregate effect on interstate commerce.

. . .This legal process is not an academic exercise to map the precise contours of the Commerce Clause or Necessary and Proper Clause — or even to vindicate our commitment to federalism or judicial review. No, all of these worthy endeavors are just means to achieve the goal of maximizing human freedom and flourishing. Indeed, that is the very reason the government exists in the first place.

And the 11th Circuit judges saw that. Countless times, Judges Dubina and Marcus demanded that the government articulate constitutional limiting principles to the power it asserted. And countless times they pointed out that never in history has Congress tried to compel people to engage in commerce as a means of regulating commerce. Even Judge Hull, reputed to be the most liberal member of the panel, conducted a withering cross-exa. . .

I realize this doesn't seem to have anything to do with Brits, but limiting the power of government was a great British ideal for centuries. In the British Liberty Timeline, men and women are in a constant struggle to limit the power of government and defend their freedom.

It's always going to be a struggle because there are always people who are going to want to take it away - sometimes for what they think or pretend they think are the most beneficent reasons.

One of the more paradoxical lessons of history is that the more government tries to "take care of you", the less freedom you have and the less you flourish.

You might well wonder why some Americans are so resistant to establishing a health system which resembles Britain's NHS.

Walking to the Twyford village shop today, across two swiftly running rivers and along the fields, I did not feel less free because the NHS exists.

Many people in Britain probably obtain real medical help and comfort from it.

There are stories which suggest that the level of care is uneven, perhaps even grossly so. Balanced against this is the fact that everyone in Britain who needs medical care will receive it even if they have to wait months to get it.

The British people who pay for the NHS with their taxes have less freedom to spend their pay cheques, since a large portion goes to supporting the NHS, but perhaps this is a reasonable exchange for the care received.

It's true that people who are not free often can hardly imagine what it is like to be free. People who have had money siphoned out of their pay cheques before they've ever received it - clever governments to take it prior to distribution - those people can hardly think what they might have done with money they've never seen.

And perhaps they would have paid it to a health insurance company - and perhaps the amount they paid would have been less than the government took and the care they received would have been better. Or perhaps not.

They cannot imagine an alternative medical delivery system, one, for instance, in which people work very hard not because they care about you but because they want to be efficient and make more money - and perhaps they care as well. Most people don't spend much time thinking about an alternative because they have too many other things to think about - their families, their jobs, friends, football, gardens, dogs, a romance, a vacation abroad. . .

Allegedly unwritten, but called "the most stupendous fabric of human invention" in the world, and extremely important to your well-being, no matter where you dwell.

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Friends indeed. Many thanks,

David and Cat

Brits at their Best Sidebar Copyright 2006-2014 David Abbott and Catherine Glass

The people of Britain and the Anglosphere defied a world of cruelty and superstition to create life-changing gifts. This is your inheritance. Glorious. Hardcover, 140 pages, 125 colour illustrations.

Available at PG Wells Bookshop, Winchester, 01962 852 016.

The cost is ￡4.99 (plus ￡3 shipping) in the UK, $9 (plus $8 shipping) in the USA.

Please contact us at share.inheritance@gmail.com if you would like a copy.

The authors — Dr David Abbott and Catherine Glass Abbott — are the publishers of this website.

DAVID ABBOTT MD, MRCP

I have practiced medicine in England, America and Canada for the last four decades. I believe in the principles of Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights. I am a father, grandfather, bell ringer, environmental campaigner and marathoner.

Brits at their Best produced thousands of indispensable inventions, developed wildly popular sports, designed romantic houses and gardens, created astonishing literary masterpieces, lived with style and humour, tackled dangerous missions with daring and ingenuity, and fought with indomitable courage to establish and protect the free world.

We describe their superb achievements and extraordinary lives.

CATHERINE (CAT) GLASS

I saw tyranny firsthand in Eastern Europe. (My background is English, Irish, and Czech.) I received my degree in Classical Greek from Columbia University, New York, worked in publishing in the United States for twenty years, and helped the homeless for seven years.